Water to Wine

by

Jana Lyons

[Open your Bible to John 2:1-11]

Have you been to a wedding lately? If you have, you probably saw a formal ceremony and then ate some cake and drank a glass or two of punch. The whole thing might have lasted about an hour. In New Testament times marriage customs were much different. After the bride and groom received a blessing from the bride’s parents, they would proceed to the groom’s house where they were considered married. At the same time, there was a great feast at the groom’s house that generally lasted about a week. Usually, friends, family, musicians, and singers would come. And obviously, it would take a lot of food and drink for a party that big. And it was very important to the groom’s family that everyone had enough to eat and drink during the feast.

Once when Jesus and His disciples were invited to a wedding feast, they ran out of wine. [In the New Testament, the word "wine" often meant "grape juice."] Mary, Jesus’ mother, wanted to help. No one had ever seen Jesus perform a miracle, but she believed He could do something to assist the groom’s family. She told the servants to do whatever Jesus said.

In Jewish homes, there were stone pots used to hold water for washing. Jesus directed the servants to fill six of these pots with water. Miraculously, the water changed to wine. The Bible never says that Jesus touched the water or shook the pots. He simply desired it to happen, and it did. Jesus changed the water to wine.

The servants then took a sample of the wine to the man in charge of the feast. The master of the feast did not know where the wine had come from, and was very surprised that what he was drinking was such good quality wine. The best wine was generally served first at wedding feasts, and then the cheaper wine later. But this time was different.

This was Jesus’ first miracle (John 2:11). Not everyone knew exactly what happened, but those who did were even more convinced of the power that Jesus possessed. This was always the purpose of miracles: to prove that the words Jesus spoke were true and that Jesus was who He claimed to be—the Son of the all-powerful God.

*Please keep in mind that Discovery articles are written for 3rd-6th graders.

This document may be copied, on the condition that it will not be republished in print unless otherwise stated below, and will not be used for any commercial purpose, as long as the following stipulations are observed: (1) Apologetics Press must be designated as the original publisher; (2) the specific Apologetics Press Web site URL must be noted; (3) any references, footnotes, or endnotes that accompany the article must be included with any written reproduction of the article; (4) textual alterations of any kind are strictly forbidden; (5) Some illustrations (e.g., photographs, charts, graphics, etc.) are not the intellectual property of Apologetics Press and as such cannot be reproduced from our site without consent from the person or organization that maintains those intellectual rights; (6) serialization of written material (e.g., running an article in several parts) is permitted, as long as the whole of the material is made available, without editing, in a reasonable length of time; (7) articles, excepting brief quotations, may not be offered for sale or included in items offered for sale; and (8) articles may be reproduced in electronic form for posting on Web sites pending they are not edited or altered from their original written content and that credit is given to Apologetics Press, including the web location from which the articles were taken. Further, documents may not be copied without source statements (title, author, journal title), and the address of the publisher and owner of rights, as listed below.